Shruti Singh (MPA 2018) is taking on two of fashion’s biggest structural challenges: waste and sustainability.  

As India Hub Director at Canopy, she is working to advance its mission to support the development of 60 million tonnes of next-gen fibre production capacity in the next 10 years. India has large volumes of untapped and underutilised textile waste, as well as over 100 million tonnes of agricultural residue. Canopy wants to mobilise the use of these waste streams as raw materials to enable sustainable fibre production, instead of letting them go unused or burned. 

Shruti also serves as a Board Director at Fashion Revolution Global, where she guides the organisation’s long-term strategy of building transparency and resilience across fashion’s vast supply chains. Below, she reflects on her journey so far, and the impact she hopes she can bring. 

“I’ve always been drawn to how things are made. Fashion design taught me creativity. Policy taught me how to shape systems. Today, I try to bring those worlds together."

I’ve always been a creative person. I love clothes, but I was equally fascinated by how things are made - the process behind the products. This led me to study fashion design, followed by a Master’s in fashion entrepreneurship. I also began to look beyond fashion. My family enjoys board games, so I started designing games that were not only fun, but also conveyed meaning. 

In 2013, everything changed. A young woman was brutally gang raped and murdered in Delhi, later known as the Nirbhaya case, sparking nationwide protests in India. I found myself out on the streets too and unable to return to the same work afterwards. I wondered: “Is the city I live in safe? Are the systems working? Why does this kind of violence continue?” 

Through the protests, I met people leading the charge for gender justice, and started volunteering with them. I didn’t know policy or advocacy, so I offered to redesign posters and messages. My volunteer work eventually turned into an internship, but I wanted to do more.  

Coming from a design background, I quickly realised how often my experience was seen as non-traditional, and thus not taken seriously in policy spaces. I’d often be asked, “Can you make this design look prettier?” And I’d think, yes, I am able to, but I would like to contribute to beyond aesthetic designing. I would like to employ my design thinking for serious causes such as fixing the system. That’s when a mentor suggested that I study public policy or administration. As much as passion and interest matter, it is equally important to have the right tools, such as the frameworks and knowledge to recognise where change is needed, and in turn, design thoughtful and effective solutions. 

At the time, these moments in my life - being a designer, creating board games, designing protest posters - felt unconnected. However looking back, upon learning how creativity, systems, and people’s lives intersect, I see them as a crucial experiences that started my journey into social impact.   
  

Right Tools, Right Place 

   
I wanted to work in the Indian ecosystem, and was looking for a programme that understood the context of the Global South. The Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy (LKYSPP) stood out to me as it was one of the top schools in the world, and the leading one in Asia. It also came highly recommended by people I’d worked with in the policy space, as many had studied there or knew of it. When I looked at the course structure, the faculty profiles, and the flexibility of choosing electives, it felt like the right fit.  

One moment that challenged my critical thinking came during an economics lesson, where the class was tasked with analysing a country’s financial collapse. The case study traced how a series of decisions across different eras of governance led to a severely devalued currency. We were asked which prime minister had made the “right” decisions, and everyone gave confident, well-reasoned answers. But our professor concluded by saying, “Sometimes, you just don’t know”. The reality is that leaders act without perfect knowledge, and history often rewards outcomes, not the process. Although this taught me that decision-making in systems is often messy and leads to uncertain outcome, that doesn’t make the pursuit of thoughtful solutions any less vital. 

LKYSPP showed me how they truly support individuals, especially during difficult times. In my second semester, I developed a medical condition that left me unable to continue my studies. I assumed I would have to drop out, but when I explained my situation to the academic office, they responded with incredible empathy. Instead of letting me walk away, they said I could defer the semester and return when I was ready. That single gesture gave me the confidence to keep going, knowing I have got support. Once I was fully recovered, I joined the next cohort and completed my final semester with one of my best academic scores. As I walked out with my degree, members of the faculty stood to give me a hug. 

In the end, it wasn’t just the coursework that shaped me, but the way the school responded in a moment of personal crisis. It reminded me that institutions, at their best, should be about building systems that help people thrive. That experience taught me that supportive ecosystems are not just important for individuals, but also for societies. When institutions design for care and resilience, people flourish. That realisation has deeply shaped how I approach my work each day. 
   

Turning Learning into Action 

After graduation, I teamed up with a course mate to pilot a civic education programme for students in India. Drawing from everything we’d learned at LKYSPP, we created modules on moral dilemmas, negotiation, and communication. Students developed policy drafts, ran advocacy campaigns, and even worked with organisations to solve real issues. The response was amazing and demand grew quickly, leading to waitlists and parallel courses. However, after three years, we realised that the programme’s potential was greater than what we could handle on our own. In the end, we handed it over to another organisation to continue the work. 

Afterwards, I found myself back in fashion. A friend at Fashion Revolution - a global movement for transparency and sustainability in fashion - reached out for help with a policy report on cotton farming and gender equity. We looked at how women’s limited access to land, credit, training, and technology was affecting both their livelihoods and the long-term sustainability of cotton farming in India. It was the first time I had viewed fashion through a policy lens, and I knew this was work that I wanted to pursue. 

I was invited to write a second report about India’s craft sector and how it was recovering from the Covid-19 pandemic. The pandemic had laid bare long-standing challenges, such as informal work and fragile supply chains. As we spoke with stakeholders around the country, the concern of climate change kept surfacing - traditional dye plants were disappearing, and unpredictable weather was affecting production. To connect the dots between craft, climate, and fashion, we hosted roundtables with civil society groups. Following these conversations, several organisations began to build climate resilience into their craft programmes.  

This was the beginning of my work at the intersection of climate and craft ecosystems. It showed me that climate change isn’t just an external threat to culture as it is already reshaping the very foundations of craft production in India. Seeing this, I began to approach fashion not as a set of disconnected issues, but as a living system deeply tied to climate, livelihoods, and culture. 
   

Scaling Next-Gen Solutions 

   
Today, I work with Canopy, an environmental non-profit that works with the world’s largest brands and innovators to protect ancient and endangered forests by scaling sustainable sourcing and next-gen solutions. In India, my mission is to catalyse over 60 million tonnes of next-gen fibre production capacity. This is through building pathways to use the country’s enormous volumes of textile waste and agricultural residue. 

This includes the Restart Alliance, an initiative with Laudes Foundation, Fashion for Good, IDH, and Canopy - which aims to channel one million tonnes of textile waste back into global fashion supply chains through sorting, tracing, and advanced recycling. 

But perhaps the most exciting part of my work at Canopy is creating an environment that will enable this next-gen economy to thrive. Some of the work includes convening policymakers, investors, innovators, brands, and ecosystem enablers, commissioning and synthesising research, positioning the opportunity clearly, and building networks that allow innovation to scale. It is inspiring to watch entrepreneurs turn agricultural residue and textile waste into viable circular solutions. 
  

Looking Ahead 

   
I have come to believe that real change doesn’t happen in silos. Designers, policymakers, investors, brands, workers, and communities must all move together. Creativity without systematic change brings about surface-level impact. Systems without creativity lack imagination. The future requires both. 

My journey, from design studios to protest marches, from policy classrooms to boardrooms - has taught me that we can reimagine the materials we use, the industries we build, and the futures we inherit. And that is the work I want to spend my life contributing to.